Philosophy (Witt) and Communications (Lillie)

In Book 5, chapter 6, Aristotle discusses how happiness is not simply a state. He also discusses how happiness is neither a life lived for amusement, for that is seen as stupid and pointless, nor is it a life lived for relaxation because that is seen as a life preparing for an activity. Instead, a happy life appears to be somewhere in the middle, where it is lived carrying out actions that express virtue. However, he also says that those virtues may be seen differently by different people. There may be people who don’t see virtues clearly, and it that’s the case, they may live their lives falsely thinking they are living a happy life.

Aristotle was basically saying that if a person has the wrong vision of what virtues need to be lived out, then they are unable to be truly happy. I found this really interesting in relation to what is happening in our world today. The other day at I was discussing with a group of students about the recent events in Paris, and debating how it was possible for such a large amount of people in this world actually lived with the intention that killing and harming people was good. For us, it didn’t seem compressible. However, Aristotle in this case says that these people are born learning false virtues and therefore may experience what they feel as pleasure however they won’t be capable of living a happy life.